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Stories   >   Rachel Barton Pine brings her superb violin skills to the work of criminally overlooked black composers / TAKE EFFECT

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Rachel Barton Pine brings her superb violin skills to the work of criminally overlooked black composers / TAKE EFFECT

Posted: March 28, 2023

Chicago-based violinist Rachel Barton Pine plays 20th-century American composer Florence Price’s Violin Concerto No. 2 with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, conducted by Jonathon Heyward, on her new Cedille Records album Violin Concertos by Black Composers Through the Centuries.

The new release marks the 25th anniversary of Pine’s pioneering 1997 Violin Concertos by Black Composers of the 18th and 19th Centuries on Cedille.

 In addition to Pine’s 2022 recording of the Price concerto, the new album includes reissues of three performances from the earlier program, which Pine recorded with the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras’ Encore Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Daniel Hege: Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges’ Violin Concerto in A major, Op. 5, No. 2; José White Lafitte’s Violin Concerto in F-sharp minor; and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s Romance in G major for Violin and Orchestra (Cedille Records CDR 90000 214).

The 25th anniversary edition substitutes Price’s concerto, recorded in January 2022, for J.J.O., Le Chevalier de Meude-Monpas’ Concerto No. 1 in D major. Recent research indicates the 18th-century French composer probably was not of African descent, Pine writes in her introductory essay, in which she discusses the genesis of the original project and the initiatives it spawned.

The album booklet includes extensive program notes by Mark Clague, who wrote the liner notes for the original recording. Clague is professor of musicology and associate dean at the University of Michigan’s School of Music, Theatre & Dance in Ann Arbor.


TAKE EFFECT writes….The Chicago resident Rachel Barton Pine brings her superb violin skills to the work of criminally overlooked black composers, and she takes help from the Encore Chamber Orchestra and The Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

Joseph Bologne and Chevalier deSaint-Georges’ “Violin Concerto in A major, Op. 5, No. 2” opens the listen with the flowing musicianship emitting so much warmth, melody and gracefulness, as the sweeping strings are full of intricate song craft. José White Lafitte’s ”Violin Concerto in F-sharp minor” follows, and brings a sublime intimacy that’s full of careful and stirring string manipulation.

The back half of the listen offers us the indeed emotive “Romance in Gmajor for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 39”, by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, which is quite poetic, and Florence Price’s “Violin Concerto No. 2” exits with initially firm drumming that segues into a soothing, cinematic quality.

Pine has enjoyed a career spanning 40 albums as an orchestral soloist, recitalist and chamber musician, and she’s picked up awards and charted along the way. A project destined to be among the best in her catalog of work, these interpretations are fleshed out flawlessly.

Travels well with: Julian Velasco- As We Are; Aznavoorian Duo- Gems From Armenia
 

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